[robin_hart]

Hey all,
I notice some books have 'best-selling author' on them, some say 'best-seller', some say 'NYTimes best-seller' or 'USA Today best-seller'.  The last two are pretty self explanatory, but what justifies an author in calling themselves a best-selling author?  Does it mean getting into one of the Kindle 100 best-seller lists?  Does it mean getting in the top 100 free best-seller lists?
What do you think?

 

[Amanda Brice]

I've been in the Barnes & Noble Top 100, and in the Top 20 of the Nook Teen bestseller list. I bounce in and out of the Kindle Teen Mysteries bestseller list and am fairly steadily in the Top 10 of the dance bestsellers list on Kindle.

I also spent a couple of weeks around Christmas in the Top 100 for Contemporary Romance, as well as in the Top 100 overall of the free store. (All those others I've mentioned were the paid store.)

I've never called myself a bestseller and will not call myself a bestseller until such time as I ever hit one of the big girl lists like the USA Today or the NY Times.

 

[BrianKittrell]

50,000 sales.



Just kidding. There's no hard and fast rule. Most will ignore "best selling" on it's own because it comes without qualifiers. NY Times best seller and USA Today best seller notices have commonl understood qualifiers (you are outselling every other book in the world, except for those above you on the list.

If you want to use it, go ahead. I would qualify it somehow if you do. Not for me or you, but for people trying to understand why you are (self-)classified in such a way.

 

[NottiThistledore]

I'm a book blogger/reviewer in my other life (Notti Thistledore is my secret identity), and I can say that I am incredibly wary of anyone who tries to promote themselves as a "bestselling" author. It seems that every single author who tries to follow me on Twitter is a best-seller! I personally look to the traditional bestseller lists, and also to something like the top 10 or so on Amazon. Not just within your category (some of those categories only seem to contain a handful of books, after all), but overall.

 

[robin_hart]

I'm not planning to use it, I just see it a lot and wonder what people use to qualify it when I don't see any qualifiers.

 

[ElHawk]

Yeah.  Maybe some day some major, respected reviewer somewhere will lay down a ruling on what can qualify an indie author as a "bestseller."  Until then, I'd avoid using it.  My book spent about two months steadily in the Top 100 for its category, but I don't feel comfortable calling myself a bestseller without some kind of zeitgeist-approved definition of the word.

 

[robin_hart]

Yeah.  I was only thinking of it because someone posted in a post about how you can be at like 10,000 overall in the paid, but at the top of some categories.  I'm in romance, so that's not how it works.  You have to be at more like a minimum of 800 overall to get into the top 100.  So I was just thinking bestseller is an extremely vague title.

 

[Mathew Reuther]

Totally subjective marketing term.

Use it if you ever feel justified in using it, but be prepared for the eventuality that someone will ask by what standard.

 

[48209]

I actually blogged about this and there were a bunch of people who chimed in.

What we came up with was (beyond the obvious ones you mentioned) the Amazon equivalent would be hitting the top 100 overall. Although, my readers voted I deserve it anyway LOL

 

[Mathew Reuther]

I actually blogged about this and there were a bunch of people who chimed in.

What we came up with was (beyond the obvious ones you mentioned) the Amazon equivalent would be hitting the top 100 overall. Although, my readers voted I deserve it anyway LOL

By that logic you could use "Bestselling Fantasy Author" if you hit top 100 genre.

And I'm not saying you should or should not do any such thing. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

 

[Kay Bratt]

Wish I knew where but just this week I read on some online article that a title would have to hit at least 40,000 sales to be on the NY Times List. I don't know if that's true, but I remember thinking that if that was the scale, my memoir is definitely a bestseller. That made my day.


(It has been in the Top 10 of all of Amazon Kindle titles, as well as another time in the Top 50)

 

[QuantumIguana]

It's like "Light" on food. Most people assume it means lower calories, but it can mean lighter in texture or color, or mean nothing at all. I suppose best seller could mean that it's the author's best seller. I think it would be fun to put "Pulitzer Prize Eligible" on a book cover.

 

[dalya]

Balls.

 

[Gone To Croatan]

Is there anyone here who hasn't been on one of the Amazon best-seller lists at some point ? A single sale on one of the non-US/UK sites often seems to get a book there.

Personally I wouldn't claim to be a best-seller unless I was at least on a major genre best-seller list on the US or UK site and stayed there for a while. But technically it would be true and I have the screenshots to prove it .

 

[ElHawk]

Caitie, I actually really like the idea of hitting Top 100 Overall as a straight "Bestseller" or "Amazon Bestseller." I also like Mathew's suggestion of "Bestselling [category]" for Top 100, too. Hey, that would make me a bestseller in both historical fiction and women's fiction. Yay!

However, until it becomes kind of ingrained in the consciousness of readers and prominent reviewers, I'd still avoid using it. This ebook/indie stuff is still so new, it's all just spooky uncharted territory.

Ha -- Quantum, you could put "Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize!" on a cover. All it takes to nominate a book for the Pulitzer is $50. They even take self-published nominations.

 

[Kay Bratt]

Ha -- Quantum, you could put "Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize!" on a cover. All it takes to nominate a book for the Pulitzer is $50. They even take self-published nominations.

And be ready for a firestorm!

http://openchannel.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/05/09/11608553-conservative-author-jonah-goldberg-drops-claim-of-two-pulitzer-nominations?lite

 

[DarkScribe]

Hey all,
I notice some books have 'best-selling author' on them, some say 'best-seller', some say 'NYTimes best-seller' or 'USA Today best-seller'. The last two are pretty self explanatory, but what justifies an author in calling themselves a best-selling author? Does it mean getting into one of the Kindle 100 best-seller lists? Does it mean getting in the top 100 free best-seller lists?
What do you think?

Recently a new Kindle release was billed - on its cover - as a "New York Times" best seller. I watch the NYT lists pretty carefully - have for many years. I have a copy of EVERY NYT best seller. (Part of my job.) I didn't recall this title so I checked the lists. The book was reviewed by the Times but it had mediocre sales.

I gather from this that all it takes is to make such a claim is sheer cheek.

 

[48209]

Actually, there was some backlash about the genre best seller list. Almost anonymously they felt like it was (to steal a reader's words) "a cheat."

That was what started the conversation (the genre best seller, when I hit the top of it). Another reader put it like all those kids playing sports where no one loses and everyone gets a trophy.

I'm not saying don't do it. I'm just saying that there was universal backlash on the blog and twitter during the discussion.

 

[robin_hart]

Actually, there was some backlash about the genre best seller list. Almost anonymously they felt like it was (to steal a reader's words) "a cheat."

That was what started the conversation (the genre best seller, when I hit the top of it). Another reader put it like all those kids playing sports where no one loses and everyone gets a trophy.

I'm not saying don't do it. I'm just saying that there was universal backlash on the blog and twitter during the discussion.

Do you have a link to the blog post? Pretty please?

 

[Mathew Reuther]

Balls.

I just want to quote this because I can.